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Originally Posted by philippe  Note: I think the idea that Beijing can pretty much have any president of their liking elected a bit scary for democracy but that's just me. |
Well, at least the three previous elections they failed to - each time it was the person particularly despised by them who won: and twice their attempts to "dissuade" the Taiwan people from voting for such candidate backfired and got them a strong majority vote instead (Lee Teng Hui -/KMT missiles lobbed over island; Chen Shui Bian /DPP - finger wagging warning from Zhu Rongji). Chen's reelection was a much closer affair (shooting incident helped) and this year the mainland leadership basically stayed on the sidelines, and let the Taiwanese people's disillusionment with Chen and DPP run its course.
